


in case you couldn't tell (can i tell you how i'm feeling?)

by orphan_account



Category: SKAM (France)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Angst with a Happy Ending, Friends to Lovers, Love Confessions, M/M, and they were roommates (oh my god they were roommates)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-05
Updated: 2020-04-29
Packaged: 2021-02-28 19:34:21
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,459
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23492527
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: He remembers himself swaying with the pull of the words, knees threatening to give in. He remembers thinking—one second more, one second more and he’d melt into a pile of useless limbs and weak muscle on the blue and messy carpet.Lucas was so drunk he could barely keep his eyes open, and he’d just told Eliott that he loved him.(or: Eliott is good at hiding how he feels. Lucas gets drunk and tells him that he might want something more.)
Relationships: Eliott Demaury/Lucas Lallemant
Comments: 30
Kudos: 401





	1. i.

The first time Lucas says it, Eliott’s knees almost give in.

He had carried Lucas home, the boy fresh from a drinking spree with Yann, Basile and Arthur, and it seems as if they’ve visited every bar in Paris with the way Basile had called him all frantic and tipsy, asking Eliott to _take Lucas home before he vomits on his new coat_ , _jesus fucking christ._ Eliott already had one arm through his jacket before he could even hang up.

When he arrived, Lucas had greeted him with grabby hands. The younger boy was sitting on the curb, a suspicious looking stain on his crisp white t-shirt, looking like an angel under the soft yellow of the streetlights. With a roll of his eyes, Eliott had crouched down, ambling over so Lucas could hop on his back with the distinct lack of grace only a person as drunk as he was could muster. Maybe it was kind of gross—what, with all the cigarette butts and beer bottles lying everywhere—but the sight of him made Eliott’s heart jump a little, still.

He supposes that’s how it works, when you’re in love with your best friend.

Out of everything, it’s the feel of Lucas’s skin that Eliott remembers most. When he went to wrap his arms loosely around Eliott’s neck, Lucas had been warm. Honey-limbed. He had buried his nose in the junction between Eliott’s neck and shoulder, and still, Eliott can feel the smile Lucas had pressed against the skin there. He was warm enough that Eliott didn’t mind how cold the air had been on the way back to their shared apartment.

The first time Lucas says it, Eliott had been a few steps away from the boy’s bed, trying very, very carefully to get him to settle in.

Lucas’s grip had tightened around him just as he was about to put him down, this absent-minded thing, all knee-jerk and lazy—a silent question. _Stay?,_ like Eliott didn’t already have his favorite pillow in Lucas’s room.

 _Stay?,_ like Eliott didn’t already have his designated side of the bed.

The first time Lucas says it, it’s with a carelessness Eliott will never forget. A soft sigh. Some shuffling under the sheets. Then—

“I think I might be in love with you.”

See, Lucas had said it so softly, it was almost inaudible. Like he hadn’t meant to say it—like sleep talking, like a secret, like a slip of the tongue. But Eliott had heard it. He heard it as though Lucas yelled it directly in his ear. 

_I think I might be in love with you._

He remembers himself swaying with the pull of the words, knees threatening to give in. He remembers thinking— _one second more_ , one second more and he’d melt into a pile of useless limbs and weak muscle on the blue and messy carpet.

Lucas was so drunk he could barely keep his eyes open, and he’d just told Eliott that he loved him.

Eliott had cleared his throat, the sound of his heartbeat loud and anxious in his ears. He remembers staring at the night light plugged next to the bedside table, the tangled wire of Lucas’s charger next to a pile of dirty clothes. He let out a soft “ _yeah?_ ” just to humor the other boy, but his hands were shaking. He couldn’t look up. Couldn’t say anything else.

He remembers hovering over Lucas, the dead weight of him. Remembers tucking him into the bed and under the covers.

He remembers Lucas’s smile, how he nodded all carefree and eyes closed as his head hit the pillow, blissfully unaware of the way he’d just broken and mended Eliott’s heart with just the weight of his words.

Eliott tried to memorize it.

The sharp curve of Lucas’s smile, the hopeful glint in his eye, a trick of the light, maybe. Intentional, hopefully.

Eliott tried to memorize the first time Lucas told him he loved him, with the reckless abandon of someone who knows he’ll never get to hear it again.

**

They don’t talk about it the following morning. Eliott remembers that, too.

He’d woken up earlier than Lucas had, migraine slowly crawling up to his temples from the lack of sleep. He’d worked himself into a stupor after Lucas had finally drifted off, spending the entirety of the night prior trying to figure out how he was going to bring it up with the younger boy, how he was going to _talk_ about it.

What could he have done, anyway? —cornered Lucas into a wall and said, _Hey! Did you mean it? Are you in love with me? Because I’ve been in love with you since we were kids and it’s honestly kind of breaking my heart!_

It was tempting.

Eliott needed to go back to bed.

He’d been crouching in front of his laptop, school work scattered around the kitchen counter, when Lucas finally emerged from his room. He'd been yawning, hair a mess, rubbing sleep from his eyes, but he wasn't in the pajamas Eliott wrangled him into the night before.

He looked ready to leave, in fact, backpack slung over one shoulder.

“Hey,” Eliott had greeted, a little lost. It was 10 AM. “Where are you going?”

Lucas jolted at the sound of Eliott’s voice like he hadn’t even realized he was there, and immediately shuffled over, socked feet dragging lazily over the hardwood. When he reached Eliott, Lucas had paused—just _looked._ There was a small smile on his face, and a little bit of dried drool around the corner of his mouth, and Eliott thought—

Eliott thought, this is it, maybe. They were going to talk about it.

Instead, Lucas had buried his face into Eliott’s shoulder and _whined._

“I have this group thing for one of my classes,” He spoke into Eliott’s shirt, nose smushed against the fabric. His voice was muffled. Eliott felt kind of dumb. “We were supposed to meet today and I totally forgot all about it. I’m like, an hour late.”

Lucas peered up at Eliott through his lashes, mouth hooked downward in a pout, before he spotted the extra cup of coffee on the counter and dragged himself away. “Is this for me?”

Eliott nodded.

He didn’t know what he was expecting, but it definitely wasn’t— _this_. Lucas was sipping happily out of the mug, eyes bright, leaving Eliott feeling all out of sorts. He’d been prepared for stilted conversation, drawn out silences, tip-toeing around words.

He'd been prepared for heartbreak, maybe, if he’s being honest.

Eliott had woken up waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Instead, Lucas was smiling at him from behind his coffee, acting like nothing had happened.

 _Had nothing really happened?_ _Did he dream it all up?_

“Hey, Eliott,” Lucas said. Eliott had to shake his head a little, had to snap himself out of it. He turned to look at Lucas with a strained smile.

“Hm?”

“I didn’t give you a hard time last night, did I?” He was sheepish, Eliott noted. His ears were red. Still, Eliott wanted to say, _no. That’s not it._ That doesn’t seem like an opening line to what Eliott had expected to be confrontation, and rejection, and _I was drunk, really, I didn’t mean it._

Lucas was leaning against the kitchen sink so casually, like he was about to apologize to Eliott for something trivial. Like vomiting down his shirt or something.

“What—“ Eliott stuttered. He felt mildly like an idiot. “I—”

“I mean, I didn’t do—didn’t say anything stupid, did I?” Lucas had interjected, pouring the rest of his coffee into the sink. Eliott stared at his back, at the muscles tensing under his shirt. When Lucas turned to face Eliott again, his cheeks were red. “God, I was so fucking drunk last night, I don’t think I even remember anything. My head feels like it’s going to _explode._ ”

 _Ah._ So it was like that.

He tears his gaze away, opting to focus on the dimmed light of his computer screen, planning to stare at it until Lucas walks out. Eliott can’t look at him right now, not really. Not when it aches a little, deep down the center of his chest, right where his heart is, just to look.

“You’re good,” Eliott mumbles, smile small. “Nothing I haven’t seen before.”

He hears Lucas sigh out of _relief_ at Eliott’s reply.

It’s not quite the _I was drunk, really, I didn’t mean it,_ that Eliott was expecting, but essentially—essentially, it’s the same thing.

It just hurts a little more, is all.


	2. ii.

“Are you going to tell him, or am I going to have to tell him myself?” Idriss raises an eyebrow, having long abandoned the essay he had been working on in favor of yelling at Eliott over the sorry state of his love life. Eliott looks away, bowing his head to sip on his drink.

“He doesn’t feel the same, Idriss, give it up. I don’t want to fuck our friendship over just because I can’t keep my feelings to myself.”

“He told you he was _in love_ _with you.”_

“He was drunk.”

“Doesn’t that mean he _means_ it, then?” Idriss’s patience is running thin. He’s glaring at Eliott now, eyes narrowed. “I don’t know about you, but I don’t go around lying to people about being in love with them when I’ve had something to drink.”

**

When Eliott was seven years old, his dad landed a job in Paris and his family had to move. He’d always been a little shy, even as a kid, and it was always hard for him to make friends—so it was scary, really, moving someplace new. He had spent the entire trip to their new neighborhood going over how he was going to introduce himself to his classmates in his head, arms wrapped tightly around his favorite stuffed animal.

It turns out he didn’t even have to try so hard, anyway—not when a boy named Lucas had barreled into him at recess on his first day of school, all blue eyes, wild hair, and missing teeth. He had stretched his arm out for Eliott to shake, the picture of confidence, and told him, “Hi! I’m Lucas. Wanna see something cool?”

 _Something cool_ turned out to be a worm Lucas had dug out from the ground.

It was actually kind of gross, but Eliott spent the rest of recess pretending to be fascinated by the way the it wiggled on the younger boy’s palm, too grateful to have made a friend that he couldn’t even speak.

They’d been inseparable ever since.

And they’ll continue to be, Eliott thinks, if he just gets his shit together enough to be happy with what they have right now.

Because what they have right now is wonderful and _reliable_. What they have is there for Eliott after a long day, cuddles into Eliott’s side when it’s cold out, sticks frozen feet against his calves when it’s warm.

What they have is Lucas sleepy in the kitchen, shoveling cereal into his mouth, sunlight filtering in through the window. What they have is Lucas humming the Star Wars theme when he washes the dishes, Lucas begging Eliott to watch Twilight with him for _‘the cultural value’,_ Lucas packing lunch for Eliott to eat on the bus when he goes to see his therapist. 

What they have is a lot more than Eliott thinks he deserves.

He decides a little heartbreak is nothing, compared to that.

Granted, sometimes—

Sometimes, it’s a little difficult, is all.

Eliott’s always been pretty good at reigning his emotions in—at keeping everything under control and buried under this facade of _cool, calm and collected._ He’s had time to come to terms with his feelings for Lucas anyway, has come to accept it as one of the irrevocable, unwavering truths of life.

Like how the sky is blue, how there are sixty seconds in one minute, and how he’ll probably be helplessly in love with his best friend for the rest of his sad, sad life.

It’s fine. Eliott’s an expert at repressing his emotions.

But sometimes—

Sometimes, Lucas will do _something_ and the feeling will balloon in his chest again, blooming in the space right below his sternum, all heavy and uncontainable and _too much._

Sometimes, just when Eliott thinks he can’t possibly love Lucas any more than he already does, Lucas will do _something_ and Eliott will fall in love with him a little bit more.

Like—

Like when Lucas had fallen asleep on the kitchen counter on midterms week, biology books piled high around him like a fort.

Eliott had walked out of his room in the middle of the night to get a glass of water and found Lucas there, creases on his cheeks from the crumpled pages of the book he was sleeping on. He had heard Eliott’s footsteps and jolted awake, all warm, disoriented, and sleep-soft, and the first thing he did when he saw Eliott was _smile._

Or last winter, when their heater broke and the cold was seeping through the windows and the floorboards, turning Eliott’s feet into icicles.

Lucas had walked out of his room wearing two sweaters, two pairs of pajamas, three pairs of socks, a scarf, _and_ a jacket. The hood was drawn tight over his head, strings tied into a neat ribbon, and the only thing Eliott could see was the pink of his nose poking through the fabric. _“Come here,”_ Lucas had said, greasy and exaggerated, trying to wrangle a hysterical Eliott into his arms _, “I’ll warm you up.”_

Or when it had been one of _those_ days—those days when Eliott wakes up and somehow, everything just feels wrong, like his chest is too tight, or his head too heavy, and all he can really do is bury himself under the covers and sleep until it goes away.

Lucas had known, well-versed in Eliott’s ups and downs, and he didn’t make a big deal out of it. He made coffee for himself and tea for Eliott, and he sat himself down in front of the electric keyboard and played a ridiculous classical rendition of a _Skrillex song._

It’s the little things that Lucas does, really, that are enough to send Eliott careening a little over the edge—that make Eliott want to grab Lucas by the shoulders, shake him senseless, and say, _let’s talk about it, don’t push it under the rug, I want to talk about it, I want you to mean it_

It’s the little things that make Eliott a little greedy, always wanting more than Lucas can give him.

**

**sofiane:** _hey maybe you should download tinder_

**eliott:** _?_

**sofiane:** _this is me telling u to stop being a martyr and date around!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!_

 **sofiane:** _i know ur a tortured artist but self-destruction is NOT the way to go_

**eliott:** _???????????????????????????????_

**

Eliott doesn’t download Tinder.

He does, however, go on a date with a girl from his Art History class. Her name is Colette, and she’s cute, and funny, and has a tattoo of a Klimt painting on her forearm.

Here’s how it happens:

Everything returns to how things usually are.

Days blend into nights, and Eliott and Lucas go back to orbiting around each other in silent routine. Lucas finishes his Twilight marathon and moves on to devouring every Studio Ghibli film on Netflix with renewed vigor. He’d been spending most nights burrowed into their couch, curled under layers upon layers of blankets from both of their bedrooms, and it’s cute. He cried a lot watching _Ponyo._ Eliott had to try very hard not to kiss him.

On the other hand, school work beings to pile up in Eliott’s mental to-do list. Eliott is too busy to think about much else outside of school work, and the ache of being in love with Lucas tucks itself away inside the harried mess of his pre-finals brain.

Eliott _manages._

That, however, doesn’t last very long.

Eliott’s composure finally breaks at 3 in the morning on a Friday.

He’s four cans of red bull in, cramming an essay he put off for way too long, and he wants to _die._

He’s moved to the kitchen, far too tempted by the sight of his own bed, and has been camping out there for hours on end, trying to compose a conclusion that didn’t make him want to forcefully throw his laptop down four flights of stairs.

Lucas’s door creaks open before he can seriously contemplate it, and the thought evaporates into thin air.

Lucas’s silhouette approaches him under the dim yellow of the kitchen light, and Eliott finds that he’s wearing this ridiculous pajama set—little smiling porcupines stitched into the fabric. It looks like he’s sleep walking, eyes barely open.

“Hey,” Eliott greets softly. “Couldn’t sleep?”

Lucas stops at Eliott’s feet, blinks owlishly, and says nothing—like Eliott’s words have gone over his head.

He lets out a slow hum and stares at Eliott for a bit, pillow creases marking his cheek, and like everything else Lucas does, Eliott thinks it’s cute. He figures Lucas is barely awake, all sleep-warm and slow like this—figures he got up to get a glass of water, or to tell Eliott to turn the lights off.

Eliott shrugs it off and is about to go back to work, hands poised over the keyboard, when Lucas slowly ducks under and _fits himself in between Eliott’s arms._

Eliott’s fingers still, but Lucas carries on, squeezing himself into the space there, movements slow and absentminded, like he’s on autopilot. With a bit of shuffling, he successfully sits down on Eliott’s lap, arms and legs slowly wrapping around Eliott’s torso and head tucked against his chest, like a baby koala.

Eliott can’t breathe.

His throat runs dry, body going stiff, all frozen muscle and wide eyes. If Lucas notices it, he doesn’t let it show, just curls himself closer, hands forming fists around the back of Eliott’s t-shirt.

Vaguely, Eliott thinks he must be dreaming.

 _It’s the red bull,_ Eliott thinks, heartbeat loud in his ears, _I drank too much and now I’ve officially lost my fucking mind._

Except—

Except Lucas makes a noise of protest, lips dragging against the scratchy cotton of Eliott’s t-shirt, and huffs, “Why aren’t you hugging me back?”, and Eliott is grounded again, back to reality, thinking, _yeah. Okay. This is real. This is happening._

A little hopelessly, he lets out a squeak at the words, arms automatically winding themselves around Lucas’s hunched over form.

Warmth spreads down to his fingertips, to his toes, and just once, Eliott imagines what it would be like to have this everyday—to get Lucas this _close_ without having to ever second guess himself. To have the small privilege of getting to touch in the sweet, absentminded way that lovers do, hands reaching out in the dark, all quiet comfort and always knowing where the other lays without even having to look.

Lucas relaxes against him, all warm and honey limbed like the night he told Eliott he might love him, and Eliott is overcome with the persistent ache of never having _this_ , of being so in love it leaves him dizzy and never having the means to get over it, not really.

He blinks it away, hand running slow circles over the expanse of Lucas’s back, and when he says, “What’s gotten into you, huh?”, his voice is all weird. All wrong.

Lucas curls closer and says, “Just miss you, s’all.”

And Eliott thinks, _yeah,_ even though they’re together most of the time. _Yeah. Me too._

**

It’s what drives him to go on that date.

It’s also what drives him to spend most of his days in the library, or in Sofiane’s apartment, or anywhere that isn’t home, really—anywhere that doesn’t have Lucas in it, walking around like all of Eliott’s most desperate daydreams combined.

He only goes home only to shower or pick up anything he’s forgotten, to do laundry, to get snacks. He turns into a ghost roommate that pays rent, and it’s fine. Eliott tells himself that he’s only doing this to take a break, to piece himself back together. 

On a Tuesday, Eliott comes home to grab a couple of chargers he forgot, only to find Lucas curled up on the couch, _Spirited Away_ playing softly in the background. He’s staring at Eliott as he makes his way to the door, eyes unreadable in a way Eliott doesn’t like.

“You’re not sleeping here tonight?” He asks, voice hesitant and quiet. Eliott hitches his backpack higher on his shoulder.

The atmosphere is weird, has him grappling for his words a little awkwardly.

“Um. No, I’m staying over at Sofiane’s.“

“Oh.” Lucas nods, turning away. He’s smiling at his hands, busy playing with the hem of the blanket he’s cocooned under. It doesn’t reach his eyes. “Have fun.”

“Yeah,” Eliott replies. “Thanks.”


	3. iii.

So—Colette.

Eliott’s not the type to use other people as distractions, really—he’d like to think he’s better than that. Just.

Just, he goes on that date, and it’s good.

It’s nice, really—easy in a way that hasn’t always been with Lucas. They go to the Louvre like a couple of cliché art students and Colette talks about the history behind the art, whip-smart and articulate and charming.When Colette smiles, it takes up half of her face, all gap-toothed a little, all sunshine creeping up to her cheeks, and Eliott finds himself distracted the way he promised himself he wouldn’t be, the way that makes him feel a little guilty, because that’s not how it should be when you promise a person your time, not really.

Because Eliott’s only weak, after all.

He’s familiar with the stories behind every piece, has learned them when he was sixteen and pretentious about art, so although Colette’s sweet, Eliott can’t find it in himself to be half as interested as he should be. They stop before the Mona Lisa, and all Eliott can think about is the last time he was here with Lucas, how initially, the younger boy had pretended to be fascinated, pausing before the paintings, fingernails bitten down to the skin. When they’d stopped before the Mona Lisa, Lucas had given up, told Eliott with a crooked smile, all shy and quiet, _I mean—it’s pretty,_ then proceeded to stand amongst the sea of tourists, trying to copy the painting’s infamous lilt of a smirk.

Eliott had wanted to kiss him then. He still wants to, now. It’s the same ache.

He gets coffee with Colette, and the day ends with stilted goodbyes, them mutually deciding that they’d like to do this again, really—but maybe just as friends. It’s a small mercy Colette gives him, Eliott’s shoulders sagging with the relief of it, and when he walks home, Eliott remembers the smile she had given him before they parted ways—all small and sharp and _knowing_ —and he thinks, _god._ God.

_If he looked at himself in the mirror, would he see the same thing Colette saw? The Eliott that’s just the right amount of uninterested for it to be obvious?_

_The Eliott that’s so in love with Lucas that he can’t see anybody else?_

It’s a little embarrassing. It’s also the most honest he’s been with himself in weeks.

When he gets home, Eliott posts a picture of the Mona Lisa on his Instagram, Colette’s silhouette a blurry presence on the far left of the frame.

Lucas texts him five minutes later.

**

**lucas:** _we should talk_

**

Eliott comes home to their shared apartment for the first time in weeks.

Maybe there’s a metaphor in there somewhere—in the way Lucas had only asked to talk, but Eliott’s mind had betrayed the words and translated it to _come home._

Maybe he’s projecting.

When he gets there, the atmosphere is tense, and Eliott has to pull at his collar a little because he feels like he can’t breathe. He lines his shoes up by the door next to Lucas’s ratty old Converse, and when he goes to stand up, he finds the younger boy sitting on one of the mismatched stools by the kitchen counter, knees pulled up to his chest.

“Hi,” Lucas says. Eliott stalks forward and settles into the seat next to him.

When he meets Lucas’s eyes, he forces out a smile; a tentative _hey,_ like it’s casual—like there isn’t this undercurrent of _something_ running through their stilted conversation, like Eliott isn’t stopping himself from reaching out right now, just to _touch._

Lucas looks like he just woke up from a deep sleep, white t-shirt thin and stretched out around the collar. Shadows pool in the space between his collarbones, all sharp edges underneath the shitty kitchen light, and Eliott has to stop himself. Has to look away.

“You went to the Louvre?” Lucas asks.

Eliott blinks. Looks up. “Yeah, I—uh. I haven’t been in a while, so I thought why not, you know?”

Lucas hums at that, nods his head a little excessively. He’s won’t look at Eliott. Instead, he’s playing with his fingers, and Eliott finds that they’re all fucked up, nails bitten down to the skin the way Lucas does when he’s anxious. When he’s sad. Something heavy burrows itself into the pit of Eliott’s stomach and he finds himself leaning forward, fingers aching to reach for Lucas’s own. “I told you to quit biting your nails—“

“Listen, Eliott,” Lucas blurts, head jerking up. He’s got this sort of frenzied look in his eyes and Eliott draws his hand back at the sight of it, almost like he’s been burned. “I was looking at ads for apartments online, and I found this studio somewhere downtown for really cheap—“

“What,” Eliott interrupts.

It’s not a question. He furrows his brows at Lucas’s words, confused at the implication of it.

_Is he moving out? Why?_

“Our lease doesn’t end ‘til next year, why are you—Lucas, what?”

Lucas falls silent. There’s this helpless look in his eyes, like he doesn’t know what to say, and Eliott’s mind reels a mile a minute, thinking back to all the times he’s betrayed himself.

All the times he’d let himself stare a little longer, touch a little more tenderly, speak a little softer, all fond and painful and _obvious._ All the times he’d let Lucas see how _gone_ he really is for him.

All the times he’d been so helplessly, helplessly in _love_.

Does he know?

Did Eliott make him uncomfortable enough that he couldn’t find it in himself to _stay?_

“I’ll move out,” Eliott rushes, steels himself. “It’s only fair, you found this apartment first. I can stay at Sofiane’s in the meantime—“

“ _Don’t_.”

It’s strangled, the way Lucas shakes his head. There’s something stubborn there—something angry, and Eliott sees it in the set of his jaw.

“Don’t do that. I don’t want that.”

“I—“ Eliott feels dumb. “What?”

“Don’t stay at Sofiane’s.”

“Okay...?” Eliott says, a little helpless. “But Lucas, I’ll need time to find a place to move to—“

“Why do you keep _avoiding_ me?” Lucas interrupts. His brows are furrowed, jaw working, biting at the inside of his cheek. He won’t look at Eliott again. “Things have been so fucking weird lately, Eliott, I—you’ve barely spoken to me in _weeks_.”

Guilt crawls up Eliott’s spine.

 _Of course_ Lucas had noticed—how stupid is Eliott, thinking he wouldn’t—thinking he wouldn’t when he’s known Eliott like the back of his hand since he was seven years old?

“Lucas,” Eliott says, hand circling around the younger boy’s wrist.

Lucas’s head snaps up at the contact, and when he looks at Eliott there are _tears_ in his eyes, wide and glassy, threatening to spill over the red of his cheeks.

Eliott’s brows furrow at the sight of it, grip tightening over the skin of Lucas’s hand.

“I’m sorry if I fucked things up, _okay,_ I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable, but—but you have to _talk_ to me, Eliott, you can’t just _ignore_ me—“

_Uncomfortable?_

“Stop—“ Eliott feels out of depth. He leans forward, tries desperately to get Lucas to look him in the eye. “ _Uncomfortable?_ Lucas, what?”

Lucas’s eyes narrow at that, firing up something angry over the ice cold blue. He’s looking at Eliott like he has no right to be _confused_ , hand pulling back against the force of Eliott’s grip.

“Don’t make me say it.”

Eliott’s hand falls to his lap. “I don't understand.”

Lucas tilts his chin up at the response, the way he always does to show _defiance—_ all stubborn, and full of pride, and so endearing it makes Eliott’s bones ache. When he opens his mouth to speak, the tremor in his voice betrays him.

“I know you’re not _stupid,_ Eliott—and I know I’m not the most discreet person, either, so I—I guess you already know that I’m in love with you,” Lucas lets out a strained laugh, humorless and empty. “You’re probably just trying to be nice about it, so I’m sorry for—I’m sorry for crossing the line sometimes. For, like. Sitting on your lap, and holding your hand, and sleeping in your bed. I know it probably makes letting me down a lot more complicated than it needs to be, so I—I’m _sorry,_ Eliott, okay? I won’t, like. Initiate anything anymore. But just—I hope you understand that it’s just hard not to, sometimes. For me. It’s hard not to when it’s you. So m’sorry I made it weird. I’ll try not to anymore.”

Eliott’s mouth runs dry.

_I guess you already know that I’m in love with you._

_I’m in love with you—_

Not _might be._

_I’m **in love** —_

“Fuck—“ Eliott blurts out, eyes comically wide. He’s _dreaming—_

Lucas squeaks at that, and when Eliott turns to look, he finds that he’s shrinking a little in his seat.

“Okay, well, I know that wasn’t the most _articulate_ confession ever, but you don’t have to be a _dick_ about it—“

He’s _ridiculous._

Eliott gasps out—“You’re in love with me?”

Lucas peers up at the older boy, looking shyest he’s been all night. His cheeks are flushed when he nods, arms slowly wrapping around his torso like a shield.

When he says, “ _I am_ ,” it’s so, so quiet and painfully _honest_ that Eliott almost blacks out.

“Wow,” Eliott breathes, shaking his head a little desperately. “Lucas I— _wow.”_

Lucas’s head snaps up at that, eyes widening in confusion and what looks a little like _hope._

Oh _wow_ , Eliott thinks.

He leans forward in his seat, palm warm against the jut of Lucas’s jaw. His eyes are glossing over again, all ocean blue as he looks up at Eliott through his eyelashes. Eliott wants Lucas to look at him like this for the rest of his life.

“You’re in love with me?” Eliott asks, staring at the impossible pink of Lucas’s mouth.

“How many times are you going to make me say it?”

Eliott laughs wetly at that.

He surges up to brushes his lips against Lucas’s own, and his voice is reduced to a whisper when he finally says, “I love you too,” a little disbelievingly. “I’m in love with you, too.”

“Yeah?” Lucas mumbles, hand reaching up to wrap around Eliott’s wrist.

“Yeah, Lucas.” Eliott kisses him before he can say anything else.

It’s gentle, all careful and closed-mouthed—all innocent. Lucas unravels slowly under the press of it, hand reaching down to clutch at the knee of Eliott’s jeans. Before he knows it, Eliott is tilting down, tongue licking into the soft seam of Lucas’s mouth, over the ridges of his teeth. Lucas lets out a breath at that, the sound driving Eliott light-headed as he pushes deeper, feels the shape of Lucas’s perfect mouth against his.

The second time Lucas says it—says, _I love you,_ he had been hunched over in their kitchen, ready to _move out._

Completely, mind-numbingly _sober._

And now—

Now, Eliott’s got a lap full of _boy_ , Lucas pressing his mouth deeper against Eliott’s, arms slowly wrapping around his neck.

The third time Lucas says it—

The third time, he’s pulling apart for air, and it rushes out of him like he’s waited to say it his whole life.

“I love you,” Lucas breathes.

He presses a quick kiss unto Eliott’s mouth, then his nose, then each cheek bone, small hands cradling Eliott’s face like he’s something special. He repeats it after each kiss, all ridiculous and eager and so, so fucking _sweet—_

_I love you._

_I_ _love you, I love you, I love you._

“Me too,” Eliott laughs, a little choked up. “I love you.”

Eliott stops counting.

**Author's Note:**

> wow this is truly way longer and way more dramatic than it needs to be but--i FINISHED it. are u guys proud of me?
> 
> do tell me what you think about it in the comments, because i thrive on validation. or don't. ajhdjads either way, i hope you enjoyed reading this as much as i did writing it. 💘 as always, you can find me on tumblr @dcmaurys.
> 
> mwah i love u. 💌


End file.
